Portfolio’s Felix Salmon blogs about CNBC’s recent PZE “obsession”…

CNBC has, over the past couple of weeks, suddenly discovered an obscure Argentine energy stock called Petrobras Energia. On December 28, it ran an interview with fund manager Ken Heebner, who said that he really liked energy stocks in general, and Petrobras in particular. Except that the chart that CNBC ran to accompany the interview showed not Petrobras shares, which trade under the ticker symbol PBR, but rather those of its Argentine subsidiary, Petrobras Energia, which trades under the ticker symbol PZE.

That day, volume in PZE, which is normally around 360,000 shares, spiked tenfold to 3.6 million. Quite impressive for the quiet week between Christmas and New Year.

CNBC did acknowledge the error, but apparently it now had PZE on the brain, because the Argentine company was then featured on Jim Cramer’s show on Monday, where the madman said that it was an “underexposed Latin American energy stock that could be poised for big gains”. Apparently he was believing his own hype: three days previously, in a call-in segment, he’d told a caller that PZE was a great way of playing Brazil, despite the fact that PZE has a separate listing largely because it’s not a Brazil play. “You should buy this stock. I got to tell you, I like Brazil so much,” he said.

Daily Live+SD Ratings for January 9, 2008

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The O’Reilly Factor will “examine” ties between GE and The Bin Laden Group according to promos running on FNC today. The ad refers to a former NBC News correspondent who will claim that the alleged ties affected NBC News coverage. I’m going to assume this will be John Hockenberry and his recent charges against his former employer…

The New York Times’ Brian Stelter interviews Jonathan Klein after the New Hampshire primary…

“On nights where there are these big events, there’s no question where America tunes to get the information,” said Jon Klein, the president of CNN/U.S., in a phone interview Thursday.

Mr. Klein had good reason to take a victory lap: in the all-important 25- to 54-year-old demographic that CNN sells advertising based on, his network drew an average of 1.35 million viewers in prime time on Tuesday, while Fox News’ number was 901,000. Cable news traditionally attracts older viewers, but CNN also managed to collect 543,000 viewers in the 18- to 34-year-old demographic — more than both Fox News and MSNBC combined.

Fox News drew more viewers for the total day: 1.30 million, compared with CNN’s 1.03 million and MSNBC’s 629,000.

“There’s a freshness and exuberance to our coverage that the others just aren’t matching,” Mr. Klein boasted. By contrast, “Fox almost seems downright despondent in their coverage,” he added.

Update: TVNewser has FNC responding to Klein’s shot…

Update 2: CNN responds to FNC on TVNewser…

Update 3: An FNC spokesperson responded, “After three years of ratings declines and programming failures, Jon Klein — and the rest of the Clinton campaign — deserve a sincere ‘congratulations’ on their big night. In fact, we we’d like to send gift. Jon’s still living up in Chappaqua, right?”

1440 Wall Street comments on CNBC. For someone who’s ” addicted to CNBC” he sure has a lot of bad things to say about the channel…

Several excellent journalists are carrying the channel, how long can that last?

The channel is turning into an infomercial for the New York Times; can we keep Sorkin to once a week please? Ditto with David Pogue. And while we are at it Dennis Kneale needs to raise his game, his insight is perhaps on par with this blog, and we expect much more. How about more Ron Insana, pretty please?

I have been watching the channel since the FNN days of Ed Hart; rest in peace buddy. Faber, Liesman and the morning crew are excellent, Fast Money suffers without Bolling but soldiers on. The specials on McDonald’s and Wal-Mart are good stuff, too. Keep it coming. Maria’s appearance on Leno showed her in a different light; there is more substance there than we had imagined. Utilize her more.

Rupert’s appearance on Fox Business raised hackles, but Jeff Immelt of GE must have an office at CNBC given how much he is featured. He is slated to be on Eisner’s show again, apparently it was the best the bookers could do with one month’s lead time. There are a million other choices, please mix it up occasionally, Mr. Hoffman.

Tonight on Bloomberg TV’s “Night Talk”, Mike Schneider interviews Carl Bernstein about the 2008 election, focusing on Hillary Clinton, the subject of his Clinton biography. Night Talk airs at 8pm ET…

Two images from behind the scenes at the South Carolina GOP Debate which at 9pm ET tonight on FNC. A special edition of Hannity & Colmes follows from 10:30pm to Midnight.

Former FNC executive Dan Cooper pens a long meandering unfocussed piece on parts of his life, including his stint at FNC and Roger Ailes. I’ve given up trying to figure out how much of it is real and how much of it is BS. But it’s going to have tongues wagging all the same. (via Jossip)

(Video via: Slate V.com, hat tip: FishbowlDC)

The Boston Herald’s Greg Gatlin talks with FBN’s Kevin Magee in conjunction with FBN coming to Comcast in Boston. And do note the part about the Wall Street Journal.

“We’re just rolling out,” he said. “We’re 11 weeks old.”

Fox Business Network aims to appeal to a wider swath of viewers by demystifying business news. Magee says it’s resisting the urge to speak in business jargon.

“When we’re on our game and doing it the way we should, we are more easy to understand,” he said. “We think everybody is interested in making money, or perhaps more importantly these days, not losing money.”

Wall Street Journal reporters appear on rival CNBC under a pact that runs through 2012. While that’s expected to limit Journal reporters’ appearances on Fox Business, Magee points out that the deal does not cover breaking news and non-business news. “If there’s a breaking news story, we can put them on,” he said.

Update: Magee also spoke with Nicole C. Wong of The Boston Globe…
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CJR Daily’s Liz Cox Barrett writes about the media (MSNBC) and the Hillary Clinton surprise victory…

As my colleague Gal Beckerman observed earlier today, with last night’s New Hampshire victory, Hillary beat the press.

Meanwhile, the press spent some time last night beating itself.

Here is a sampling of the sort of mild self-flagellation on display last night on MBSNC (the channel I happened to be watching) where many of the network’s familiar faces-with the exception of Chris Matthews-seemed to be doing some form of soul-searching for having, as Tom Brokaw put it, prematurely and sometimes excitedly “end[ed] the Clinton era,” for having been so sure of New Hampshire’s outcome hours or even days before the polls closed. (Sounds familiar, no?) Often, it seemed to be Brokaw gently apologizing for his onetime peers. (Maybe that’s what gravitas means).

I’m going to step in here and weigh in a bit in defense of the media, and not just MSNBC, regarding what happened Tuesday. It’s easy to say “the Media got it wrong”. But “the Media” was basing its results on polling data that was nearly universally showing Obama with a major cushion going in to Tuesday’s vote.
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The Sun News’ Robert Morris previewing tonight’s debate on FNC by interviewing questioner Chris Wallace…

How are you going to choose questions?

We are going to divvy up subject areas - the economy, national security - then each of us will be responsible for a couple of subject areas.

We’re also looking for points of difference, where one person has said one thing about how to approach an area and somebody else may have a different idea.

The hope is to get a conversation going amongst the candidates about their different approaches to the same problem.

What kind of research goes into the questions?

You want to see what their positions are on the issues, what they’ve said, what they’ve said critically about each other, what outside experts have said about their policies. I’m going to look at some of the exit polls that indicate what voters’ interests and opinions are, look at past debates and what they’ve said in the past to and about each other.

Page Six dishes on Erin Burnett being in a bit of trouble over her Men’s Health article…

“This has caused a lot of hand-wringing at the network,” an insider told us, suggesting Burnett comes off as a trite, gold-digging hussy. “There’s worry she’s damaged her brand. Everybody’s talking about it and asking, like, ‘Why did you do this?’ Everybody think it’s a major [bleep]-up.’ ”

A mention of the article on Dealbreaker.com ridiculed it as, “Map to Erin Burnett’s [Bleep].” The site later substituted the word “heart” for the vulgarism. “The newsroom was talking about ‘Erin Burnett’s [bleep].’ You’ve got to wonder who gave her the idea for this story,” our source said.

Burnett, who’s been dubbed “Maria 2.0″ for her rivalry with “Money Honey” Bartiromo, wouldn’t talk to us. CNBC flack Brian Steel refused to say whether Burnett’s story set off an uproar, repeatedly telling us: “Erin is one of the most respected and insightful journalists on television today.

“It was a fun little piece,” Steel said, adding that he had pre-approved Burnett’s writing the article.

I hate linking to this because it’s serving an agenda and I don’t want ICN to be seen as aiding and abetting that agenda but unfortunately the source material is news and this is the only video version of this incident I could find. It seems pretty self-evident to me that Olbermann is just plain wrong this time. FNC did report an official denial.

HLN’s Glenn Beck will be interviewed by Neil Cavuto tonight on FBN…

Tonight on Cavuto (6-7pm ET), FOX Business Network’s Neil Cavuto will interview syndicated radio and television host Glenn Beck on his recent hospital disaster. Beck will discuss how his routine outpatient procedure turned into a medical nightmare and how the threat of lawsuits has created a lack of compassion in hospitals.

Broadcasting & Cable’s John Eggerton blogs about Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama appearing on Fox and Friends this morning…

Hardly had Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton had a chance to recoup from a night that saw the actual voters snatch Obama’s defeat from the jaws of a poll-driven, media-whipped-up victory, when both were appearing on Fox & Friends Wednesday morning, apparently not concerned that the hosts would reduce them to tears of that Fox graphics wizards might add horns and a tail, or cartoon balloons with mocking comments.

Just to see who would show up, maybe Fox should quickly add a Democratic debate to its lineup, not that there haven’t already been more debates and forums than the most dyed-(blue or red)-in-the-wool political junkies could hope for.